Science

Discover the Mysteries of Our Universe

Weird Universe is your gateway to the wonders of space. Have you ever looked up at the night sky and marveled at the mysteries hidden beyond the stars? This book takes that curiosity and turns it into an accessible, fun introduction to space, packed with all the weirdness we've discovered out there.

Unlock the wonders of space with a fresh and exciting perspective.

See how space exploration shapes our everyday world. Space isn’t just an abstract concept—it plays a crucial role in shaping the technology we use every day. From NASA’s breakthroughs to innovations inspired by our exploration of the cosmos, Hamden shows how space discoveries influence our world. You’ll also gain insight into the process behind these findings, from the questions scientists ask to the groundbreaking answers they uncover. By the end of the book, you’ll understand not just what we know about the universe, but how we’ve come to know it.

Inside, you’ll find:

• A clear, engaging look at black holes, galaxies, and the history of NASA, explained in simple terms.
• Fascinating insights into how scientists make new discoveries about space, with a focus on how it all connects to us here on Earth.
• Fun and accessible content perfect for all ages, including those learning space for kids and adults who want to dive deeper into the world of astronomy.

If you liked Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, The Illustrated Brief History of Time, or Not Necessarily Rocket Science, you’ll love Weird Universe.

Take a road trip through deep time and California history, with a friendly expert geologist at the wheel.

From its epic earthquakes to its famed epithet "the Golden State," California as we know it would not exist without geology. Gary L. Prost, an expert geologist born and raised in California, embarked on a quest to better understand the state's rocky history. His road trips have culminated in Rocks and Riches, an accessible and entertaining look at the land that has shaped the lives of all Californians. With humor and abiding curiosity, Prost examines the workings of deep time, the fascinating and troubled legacies of the Gold Rush, and the ways geology continues to influence life in California today. Visiting 56 stops of geologic interest, he traverses the Marin and Sonoma coasts, the Central Valley, the Sierra Foothills, Yosemite, and the Basin and Range country, ending with an extended journey through Death Valley to meditate on the awe-inspiring intensity of California's deserts. Including dozens of illustrations and road maps, as well as guidance for fellow travelers, Rocks and Riches is both a practical handbook and an invitation to see California's landscapes with wonder.

How worldwide plant circulation and new botanical ideas enabled Americans to radically re-envision politics and society

The Garden Politic argues that botanical practices and discourses helped nineteenth-century Americans engage pressing questions of race, gender, settler colonialism, and liberal subjectivity. In the early republic, ideas of biotic distinctiveness helped fuel narratives of American exceptionalism. By the nineteenth century, however, these ideas and narratives were unsettled by the unprecedented scale at which the United States and European empires prospected for valuable plants and exchanged them across the globe. Drawing on ecocriticism, New Materialism, environmental history, and the history of science—and crossing disciplinary and national boundaries—The Garden Politic shows how new ideas about cultivation and plant life could be mobilized to divergent political and social ends.

Reading the work of influential nineteenth-century authors from a botanical perspective, Mary Kuhn recovers how domestic political issues were entangled with the global circulation and science of plants. The diversity of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s own gardens contributed to the evolution of her racial politics and abolitionist strategies. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s struggles in his garden inspired him to write stories in which plants defy human efforts to impose order. Radical scientific ideas about plant intelligence and sociality prompted Emily Dickinson to imagine a human polity that embraces kinship with the natural world. Yet other writers, including Frederick Douglass, cautioned that the most prominent political context for plants remained plantation slavery.

The Garden Politic reveals how the nineteenth century’s extractive political economy of plants contains both the roots of our contemporary environmental crisis and the seeds of alternative political visions.

Embark on an extraordinary journey into the depths of the ocean.

Oceanographer Dawn Wright made history in 2022 when she became the first Black person to visit Challenger Deep, the deepest and most unexplored place on Earth—a trip that took her over 10,000 meters beneath the Pacific Ocean’s surface. We know less about the ocean floor than we do about the surface of the moon. To date, barely one-fifth of the seabed has been mapped in high resolution. As an ocean scientist and explorer, Dawn has made it her mission to change that.

Mapping the Deep takes you on an extraordinary adventure with an extraordinary woman into the depths of Challenger Deep, showcasing the perseverance and innovation needed for ocean exploration. With a focus on Dawn’s historic dive, her personal journey, and the cutting-edge technology that made the expedition possible, this book highlights the crucial importance of mapping the ocean and its profound impact on our planet’s future. Prepare to be inspired—from the fascinating history of the area and the incredible stories of its explorers to the diverse marine life that lives within.

Through a blend of history, fascinating facts, and beautiful images, Mapping the Deep offers a unique perspective on the challenges and triumphs of deep-sea exploration.

PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award Winner * Golden Poppy Award Winner for Nonfiction * California Book Awards Gold Medal Winner * A Great Read from Great Places selected by the Library of Congress * A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year * American Book Award Winner * 2024 American Energy Society's Energy Writer of the Year * An Architect's Newspaper Best Book of 2023 * 2024 Nautilus Book Awards Silver Medal Winner

Now in paperback: a "deeply researched and reported" (San Francisco Chronicle) exploration of sea level rise in California that "breathes exquisite detail and dialogue" (Science Magazine) into the subject.

"Viscerally urgent, thoroughly reported, and compellingly written—a must-read for our uncertain times." —Ed Yong, author of An Immense World

"When do seawalls make sense? And when is it better to give in to the tides? [...] In California Against the Sea, Xia [...] writes about the difficult realities of trying to incorporate fairness into our tally of costs and benefits." —The New Yorker

Along California's 1,200-mile coastline, the overheated Pacific Ocean is rising and pressing in, imperiling both wildlife and the maritime towns and cities that 27 million people call home. In California Against the Sea, Los Angeles Times coastal reporter Rosanna Xia asks: As climate chaos threatens the places we love so fiercely, will we finally grasp our collective capacity for change?

Xia, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, investigates the impacts of engineered landscapes, the market pressures of development, and the ecological activism and political scrimmages that have carved our contemporary coastline—and foretell even greater changes to our shores. From the beaches of the Mexican border up to the sheer-cliffed North Coast, the voices of Indigenous leaders, community activists, small-town mayors, urban engineers, and tenacious environmental scientists commingle. Together, they chronicle the challenges and urgency of forging a climate-wise future. Xia's investigation takes us to Imperial Beach, Los Angeles, Pacifica, Marin City, San Francisco, and beyond, weighing the rivaling arguments, agreements, compromises, and visions governing the State of California’s commitment to a coast for all. Through graceful reportage, she charts how the decisions we make today will determine where we go tomorrow: headlong into natural disaster, or toward an equitable refashioning of coastal stewardship.

Honorable Mention, Rachel Carson Prize, given by the Society for the Social Studies of Science

Finalist, 2023 ASAP Book Award, given by the Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present

Studies the intersections of incarceration, medical science, and race in postwar America

In February 1966, a local newspaper described the medical science program at Holmesburg Prison, Philadelphia, a “golden opportunity to conduct widespread medical tests under perfect control conditions.” Helmed by Albert M. Kligman, a University of Pennsylvania professor, these tests enrolled hundreds of the prison’s predominantly Black population in studies determining the efficacy and safety of a wide variety of substances, from common household products to chemical warfare agents. These experiments at Holmesburg were hardly unique; in the postwar United States, the use of incarcerated test subjects was standard practice among many research institutions and pharmaceutical companies. Skin Theory examines the prison as this space for scientific knowledge production, showing how the “perfect control conditions” of the prison dovetailed into the visual regimes of laboratory work. To that end, Skin Theory offers an important reframing of visual approaches to race in histories of science, medicine, and technology, shifting from issues of scientific racism to the scientific rationality of racism itself.

In this highly original work, Cristina Mejia Visperas approaches science as a fundamentally racial project by analyzing the privileged object and instrument of Kligman’s experiments: the skin. She theorizes the skin as visual technology, as built environment, and as official discourse, developing a compelling framework for understanding the intersections of race, incarceration, and medical science in postwar America.

Now in paperback: This San Francisco Chronicle bestseller and California Book Award finalist drills down into Oakland's geological history and its impacts on the city's urban present.

"This book has turned me into a newcomer to my own city, but has also changed the way I will view any landscape. I can think of few greater gifts than that."—Jenny Odell, author of How to Do Nothing and Saving Time

"Spending time with Andrew Alden is like giving yourself x-ray eyes." —Roman Mars, host and creator of 99% Invisible

Beneath Oakland's streets and underfoot of every scurrying creature atop them, rocks roil, shift, crash, and collide in an ever-churning seismological saga. In Deep Oakland, geologist Andrew Alden excavates the ancient story of Oakland's geologic underbelly and reveals how its silt, soil, and subterranean sinews are intimately entwined with its human history—and future. Poised atop a world-famous fault line now slumbering, Alden charts how these quaking rocks gave rise to the hills and the flats; how ice-age sand dunes gave root to the city's eponymous oak forests; how the Jurassic volcanoes of Leona Heights gave way to mining boom times; how Lake Merritt has swelled and disappeared a dozen times over the course of its million-year lifespan; and how each epochal shift has created the terrain cradling Oaklanders today. With Alden as our guide—and with illustrations by Laura Cunningham, author of A State of Change—we see that just as Oakland is a human crossroads, a convergence of cultures from the world over, so too is the bedrock below, carried here from parts still incompletely known.

How extreme-right antidemocratic governments around the world are prioritizing profits over citizens, stoking catastrophic wildfires, and accelerating global climate change.

Recent years have seen out-of-control wildfires rage across remote Brazilian rainforests, densely populated California coastlines, and major cities in Australia. What connects these separate events is more than immediate devastation and human loss of life. In Global Burning, Eve Darian-Smith contends that using fire as a symbolic and literal thread connecting different places around the world allows us to better understand the parallel, and related, trends of the growth of authoritarian politics and climate crises and their interconnected global consequences.

Darian-Smith looks deeply into each of these three cases of catastrophic wildfires and finds key similarities in all of them. As political leaders and big business work together in the pursuit of profits and power, anti-environmentalism has become an essential political tool enabling the rise of extreme right governments and energizing their populist supporters. These are the governments that deny climate science, reject environmental protection laws, and foster exclusionary worldviews that exacerbate climate injustice.

The fires in Australia, Brazil and the United States demand acknowledgment of the global systems of inequality that undergird them, connecting the political erosion of liberal democracy with the corrosion of the environment. Darian-Smith argues that these wildfires are closely linked through capitalism, colonialism, industrialization, and resource extraction. In thinking through wildfires as environmental and political phenomenon, Global Burning challenges readers to confront the interlocking powers that are ensuring our future ecological collapse.

A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.

Muddy Thinking in the Mississippi River Delta uses the story of mud to answer a deceptively simple question: How can a place uniquely vulnerable to sea level rise be one of the nation's most promiscuous producers and consumers of fossil fuels? Organized around New Orleans and South Louisiana as a case study, this book examines how the unruly Mississippi River and its muddy delta shaped the people, culture, and governance of the region. It proposes a framework of "muddy thinking" to gum the wheels of extractive capitalism and pollution that have brought us to the precipice of planetary collapse. Muddy Thinking calls upon our dirty, shared histories to address urgent questions of mutual survival and care in a rapidly changing world.

One of the classic works of marine biology, a favorite for generations, has now been completely revised and expanded. Between Pacific Tides is a book for all who find the shore a place of excitement, wonder, and beauty, and an unsurpassed introductory text for both students and professionals.

This book describes the habits and habitats of the animals that live in one of the most prolific life zones of the world—the rocky shores and tide pools of the Pacific Coast of the United States. The intricate and fascinating life processes of these creatures are described with affectionate care. The animals are grouped according to their most characteristic habitat, whether rocky shore, sandy beach, mud flat, or wharf piling, and the authors discuss their life history, physiology, and community relations, and the influence of wave shock and shifting tide level.

Though the basic purpose and structure—and much of the text—of the book remain the same, content has been increased by about 20 percent; a multitude of changes and additios has been made in the text; the Annotated Systematic Index and General Bibliography have been updated and greatly expanded (now almost 2,300 entries); more than 200 new photographs and drawings have been incorporated; and an entirely new chapter has been added—a topical presentation of the several factors influencing distribution of organisms along the shore. This edition also includes John Steinbeck's Foreword to the 1948 edition.

There's a silent epidemic in western civilization, and it is right under our noses. Our jaws are getting smaller and our teeth crooked and crowded, creating not only aesthetic challenges but also difficulties with breathing. Modern orthodontics has persuaded us that braces and oral devices can correct these problems. While teeth can certainly be straightened, what about the underlying causes of this rapid shift in oral evolution and the health risks posed by obstructed airways?

Sandra Kahn and Paul R. Ehrlich, a pioneering orthodontist and a world-renowned evolutionist, respectively, present the biological, dietary, and cultural changes that have driven us toward this major health challenge. They propose simple adjustments that can alleviate this developing crisis, as well as a major alternative to orthodontics that promises more significant long-term relief. Jaws will change your life. Every parent should read this book.

Discover The Geographic Approach to enabling science for a more exceptional planet.

Place matters to governments and citizens, and location intelligence and data science have never been more critical for smarter national decision-making. Addressing Earth’s Challenges: GIS for Earth Sciences explores a collection of real-life stories about how earth science organizations successfully use geographic information systems (GIS) to visualize and analyze data to streamline workflows, gain competitive insight, drive decision-making, design efficient operations, and foster civic inclusion.

Find out how multiple organizations implement GIS in six scientific fields:

• geoscience,
• sustainable energy,
• environmental monitoring,
• climate science,
• weather, and
• marine science.

The book also includes a section on next steps that provides helpful ideas, strategies, tools, and actions to help jump-start your use of GIS for earth sciences. A collection of online resources, including additional stories, videos, new ideas and concepts, and downloadable tools and content, complements this book.

Targeted for chemists, the current textbook outlines the principles, experimental methods and data analysis in X-Ray Absorption Spectroscopy (XAS). The authors introduce EXAFS, Near-Edge XAS, X-Ray Imaging and many other advanced experimental techniques. A special section of the book is devoted to applications of XAS in chemistry, materials and environmental sciences.

The second edition of the Macromolecular Chemistry broadens into two areas: biomacromolecules, Volume 1 and polymers, Volume 2. Biomacromolecules covers carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, nucleic acids, their classifications and properties. The first chapter looks at the structural formulas and cyclic forms of monosaccharides, as well as their synthesis and breakdown. Cyclization, enolization, isomerization, tautomerization, mutarotation, and epimerization are all briefly described. Examples of disaccharides and polysaccharides are also presented. The second chapter covers triglycerides, steroids, vitamins, and their constituents. The third chapter examines the primary structure of proteins, including amino acid properties, peptide bond formation, and peptide synthesis. It also addresses secondary, tertiary, and quaternary structures. The book concludes with a chapter on nucleic acids, which covers the chemistry of nucleosides and oligonucleotides as well as topics such as genetic code, DNA secret code, Polymerase Chain Reaction and DNA fingerprinting.

Catalysis is at the heart of the chemical industry, which uses solid catalysts for the large-scale production of commodity chemicals. Catalysis at surfaces is also the basis for the ongoing transition to a sustainable energy supply, which requires molecules such as hydrogen, ammonia or methanol to store energy in chemical bonds, and environmental protection equally relies on heterogeneous catalysis.

Catalysis at surfaces is a truly interdisciplinary field, which requires profound knowledge from chemistry, physics and engineering as provided by this textbook. All essential tools are described ranging from the synthesis and modification of porous solids over bulk- and surface-sensitive characterization techniques to currently applied theoretical methods. A close-up to the important aspects of surface catalysis is provided, which comprises the established knowledge about mechanisms and active sites, promotors and poisons in redox and acid-base catalysis.

This advanced textbook is recommended for Master and PhD students, for whom it provides the fundamentals and all relevant aspects of catalyst synthesis, characterization and application in suitable reactors. It is not only thermal catalysis that is covered in depth, but also photo- and electrocatalysis as emerging fields in the Energiewende.

Energy Islands provides an urgent and nuanced portrait of collective action that resists racial capitalism, colonialism, and climate disruption. Weaving together historical and ethnographic research, this story challenges the master narratives of Puerto Rico as a tourist destination and site of "natural" disasters to demonstrate how fossil fuel economies are inextricably entwined with colonial practices and how local community groups in Puerto Rico have struggled against energy coloniality to mobilize and transform power from the ground up.

Catalina M. de Onís documents how these groups work to decenter continental contexts and deconstruct damaging hierarchies that devalue and exploit rural coastal communities. She highlights and collaborates with individuals who refuse the cruel logics of empire by imagining and implementing energy justice and other interconnected radical power transformations. Diving deeply into energy, islands, and power, this book engages various metaphors for alternative world-making.

Scientists around the world rise up for climate and ecological justice

In April 2022, hundreds of scientists rose in non-violent civil disobedience, breaking the law in more than twenty-eight countries. Risking arrest, they glued their hands to roads, blocked government and corporate buildings, and chained themselves to the White House fence. In Science in Resistance, Fernando Racimo provides a first-person account of the Scientist Rebellion, an international movement of researchers stepping beyond conventional roles to alert the public about the need for action in the climate emergency. Combining personal stories, interviews with scientist-activists, and insights from research on direct action and academia, he explores the challenges scientists face when taking a stand for climate and ecological justice.

Reflecting on his role as a scientist-activist, Racimo describes how he came to be involved in the movement. He also explores the many ways in which academic institutions today are complicit in climate breakdown—whether by accepting funding from and collaborating with the very industries driving it, or by discouraging scientists from speaking up. Drawing on lessons from political science, psychology, ecology, sociology, and the history of science, he explains how academia could be transformed to become an actor for good in the emergency.

NMR Multiplet Interpretation: An Infographic Walk-Through focuses on complex first-order ¹H multiplet interpretation that the synthetic organic chemist should expect to tackle. The 2^nd edition also expands upon the interpretation of (¹H and ¹⁹F) multiplets and ties the shape of multiplets to the structural features of hypothetical chemical compounds. The book provides thoroughly-visualized illustrations, embracing an elegant and intuitive methodology from the scientific literature. Moreover, it identifies core mnemonic rules and diagrams that help the reader quickly internalize key concepts. It includes progressively-challenging problems—from simple, intermediate, advanced, to expert—and corresponding colorful answer keys that are presented wholly-visually. While this is not a textbook nor a scientific publication, it does strive to be a unique learning tool that fills an apparent need for highly-visual pedagogical materials for chemists who want to develop practical confidence with first-order multiplet interpretation and prediction. It can be either a great companion to more traditional coursework in NMR spectroscopy for students or a continuing educational tool for researchers.

This class-tested textbook gives an overview of the structure and functions of proteins and explains how amino acids form a defined structural entity with specific properties. The authors also introduce modern methods for purification and separation of proteins as well as different techniques for analyzing their structural and functional properties. A separate part of the book is devoted to enzymes and kinetics of enzymatic reactions.

New in the second edition: Since the development of computing techniques has evolved considerably during the last few years, the text benefits from the addition of a chapter on the use of computing, particularly on the use of Alpha Fold in protein research. This AI-based software can determine the protein structures from the amino acid sequence with excellent reliability. Also included a discussion on the use of molecular dynamicsand a real life example of protein purification.

Life in all its forms is based on nucleic acids which store and transfer genetic information. The book addresses main aspects of synthesis, hydrolytic stability and solution equilibria of nucleosides, nucleotides and oligonucleotides, as well as synthesis of their structural analogs that are of interest in chemotherapy. In addition, recent achievements in chemistry of catalytic nucleic acids, development of oligonucleotide based drugs and novel strategies for their targeting and delivery are discussed. The central theme always is the correlation of structure and function.

Organic Chemistry: 25 Must-Know Classes of Organic Compounds covers the main organic compounds. It includes aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons, halide, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulfur-containing compounds. It presents heterocyclic compounds and common organic mechanisms and describes carbonyl compounds, organic polymers and organic molecules with applications in medicinal chemistry.

The term nutraceuticals is applied to the products isolated from the herbal sources, nutrients or dietary supplements, processed foods, (cereals, soup and beverages) and specific diets, that may also used as medicine other than nutrition. It usually refers to the foods derived products which may sell in medicinal form, possessing physiological benefits to the host while promoting health and wellness and provide protection against chronic disorders. They may also increase the life expectancy, delay the aging and/or support the structure and function of the body organs. Demand for nutraceuticals with potential to prevent and treat chronic disorders has been interestingly increasing over the past few years. Based on food sources, nutraceuticals are classified into dietary fibers, probiotics, prebiotics, polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs), vitamins, polyphenols and spices.

A dietary supplement is generally considered as product containing vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and medicinal plants that are indented to be used to supplement the diet or a concentrate, metabolite, constituent, extract, or combinations of these ingredients. Broadly, nutraceuticals are any of these ingredients or supplements using for health purposes other than nutrition.

This book on the fundamentals of Nutraceuticals is organized in two parts i.e., the introductory aspects of macro- and micro-nutrients, gut microbiota regulation, nutraceuticals and drug interactions, while the second part is focusing on the biological benefits of nutraceuticals in different disease states. Besides, this book is also addressing the safety aspects of nutraceuticals and phytotherapeutic support in pregnancy. Including contributions from the experts in the field, target audience (pharmacists, nutritionists, other healthcare providers, and researchers in food and nutrition sector) will be benefited with the updated literature on nutraceuticals and dietary supplements.

This book is intended for beginning students, both chemistry majors and other students who require it for their program. The material is presented in a concise and student-friendly way, without the inclusion of topics unnecessary at that level. A complete section is designed to lead students through the naming of organic compounds in a self-taught manner. Reactions are grouped by mechanistic type and stereochemistry is emphasized throughout. An introduction to the spectroscopic methods used for structure determination is included. Problems are included at each stage and new in this edition are complete answers to the problems as well as an introduction to the molecules of nature.

Forests of Refuge questions the effectiveness of market-based policies that govern forests in the interest of mitigating climate change. Yolanda Ariadne Collins interrogates the most ambitious global plan to incentivize people away from deforesting activities: the United Nations–endorsed Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) initiative. Forests of Refuge explores REDD+ in Guyana and neighboring Suriname, two highly forested countries in the Amazonian Guiana Shield with low deforestation rates. Yet REDD+ implementation there has been fraught with challenges. Adopting a multisited ethnographic approach, Forests of Refuge takes readers into the halls of policymaking, into conservation development organizations, and into forest-dependent communities most affected by environmental policies and exploitative colonial histories. This book situates these challenges in the inattentiveness of global environmental policies to roughly five hundred years of colonial histories that positioned the forests as places of refuge and resistance. It advocates that the fruits of these oppressive histories be reckoned with through processes of decolonization.

With private space companies launching rockets, satellites, and people at a record pace, and with the U.S. and other governments committing to a future in space, Glenn Harlan Reynolds looks at how we got here, where we’re going, and why it matters for all of humanity.

This book offers an innovative examination of the interactions of science and technology, art, and literature in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Scholars in the history of art, literature, architecture, computer science, and media studies focus on five historical themes in the transition from energy to information: thermodynamics, electromagnetism, inscription, information theory, and virtuality.

Different disciplines are grouped around specific moments in the history of science and technology in order to sample the modes of representation invented or adapted by each field in response to newly developed scientific concepts and models. By placing literary fictions and the plastic arts in relation to the transition from the era of energy to the information age, this collection of essays discovers unexpected resonances among concepts and materials not previously brought into juxtaposition. In particular, it demonstrates the crucial centrality of the theme of energy in modernist discourse. Overall, the volume develops the scientific and technological side of the shift from modernism to postmodernism in terms of the conceptual crossover from energy to information.

The contributors are Christoph Asendorf, Ian F. A. Bell, Robert Brain, Bruce Clarke, Charlotte Douglas, N. Katherine Hayes, Linda Dalrymple Henderson, Bruce J. Hunt, Douglas Kahn, Timothy Lenoir, W. J. T. Mitchell, Marcos Novak, Edward Shanken, Richard Shiff, David Tomas, Sha Xin Wei, and Norton Wise.

A history of COVID-19 and the sociopolitical crises that led to the 2020 global pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic shocked the world. It shouldn’t have. Since this century’s turn, epidemiologists have warned of new infectious diseases. Indeed, H1N1, H7N9, SARS, MERS, Ebola Makona, Zika, and a variety of lesser viruses have emerged almost annually. But what of the epidemiologists themselves? Some bravely descended into the caves where bat species hosted coronaviruses, including the strains that evolved into the COVID-19 virus. Yet, despite their own warnings, many of the researchers appear unable to understand the true nature of the disease—as if they are dead to what they’ve seen.

Dead Epidemiologists is an eclectic collection of commentaries, articles, and interviews revealing the hidden-in-plain-sight truth behind the pandemic: Global capital drove the deforestation and development that exposed us to new pathogens. Rob Wallace and his colleagues—ecologists, geographers, activists, and, yes, epidemiologists—unpack the material and conceptual origins of COVID-19. From deepest Yunnan to the boardrooms of New York City, this book offers a compelling diagnosis of the roots of COVID-19, and a stark prognosis of what—without further intervention—may come.

Association for Humanist Sociology 2007 Book Award co-winner

Julian Steward Award 2006 Runner-Up

One community's fight against industrial contamination and environmental racism

Over the past two decades, environmental racism has become the rallying cry for many communities as they discover the contaminations of toxic chemicals and industrial waste in their own backyards.

Living next door to factories and industrial sites for years, the people in these communities often have record health problems and debilitating medical conditions. Melissa Checker tells the story of one such neighborhood, Hyde Park, in Augusta, Georgia, and the tenacious activism of its two hundred African American families. This community, at one time surrounded by nine polluting industries, is struggling to make their voices heard and their community safe again.

Polluted Promises shows that even in the post-civil rights era, race and class are still key factors in determining the politics of pollution.

Explore the night skies with this beautiful illustrated monthly guide to the stars and planets which is designed for naked-eye astronomy – perfect for both enthusiasts and beginners.

This large-format almanac allows you to step outside and track the planets, locate the Milky Way, recognise the constellations of the zodiac and watch meteor showers.

Stargazers' Almanac 2025:

• A perennially popular Holiday gift – and one which lasts the whole year round
• Features two views of the night sky for each month, looking north and south, and a visual guide to the phases of the moon and the movements of the planets
• Suitable for astronomy enthusiasts throughout the Northern Hemisphere's temperate (non-tropical) latitudes
• Printed on sustainably sourced FSC paper using plant-based inks which reduces chemical emissions and makes it easier to recycle
• Features a loop and eyelet for easy wall hanging and presented in a sturdy cardboard gift envelope – no shrink wrap!

Rafael Yuste, neurocientífico español, director del Centro de Neurotecnología de la Universidad de Columbia e ideador de la iniciativa BRAIN, nos presenta su primera obra de divulgación: El cerebro, el teatro del mundo.

Yuste nos invita a un viaje fascinante a través de la neurociencia moderna para descubrirnos uno de los mayores misterios de la ciencia: cómo ochenta mil millones de neuronas se organizan para crear la mente humana. Su teoría, «El Teatro del Mundo», concibe el cerebro como una máquina de predicción del futuro que utiliza las redes neuronales para generar un modelo del mundo como si fuese un prototipo de realidad virtual.

A través del relato de los principales descubrimientos de científicos como Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Rafael Lorente de Nó, Thomas Graham Brown, Ethel Browne, Rita Levi-Montalcini o Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, Yuste nos desvela, con un estilo sencillo y entretenido, qué es el sistema nervioso, cómo surgió en la evolución y cómo el cerebro utiliza los sentidos para predecir el futuro y elegir una acción inteligente que nos permita actuar en el mundo.

Lleno de anécdotas personales, El cerebro, el teatro del mundo es un extraordinario recorrido por la historia reciente de la neurociencia que explica que filósofos como Kant o escritores como Calderón de la Barca o Proust se adelantaron a su tiempo y fueron capaces de concebir teorías que en la actualidad se están confirmando. Para Yuste, al comprender los misterios del cerebro nos situamos en los albores de un nuevo renacimiento, un nuevo humanismo que nos permitirá dar un paso histórico que ayude a las futuras generaciones a proyectar un mundo mejor.

ENGLISH DESCRIPTION

Rafael Yuste, a Spanish neuroscientist, director of Columbia University’s Neurotechnology Center, and founder of the BRAIN initiative, presents his first popular science book: El cerebro, el teatro del mundo.

Yuste takes us on a fascinating journey through modern neuroscience to unravel one of science’s greatest mysteries—how eighty billion neurons come together to create the human mind. His theory, El teatro del mundo, conceives the brain as a future-predicting machine that uses neural networks to construct a model of the world, almost like a virtual reality prototype.

Through the stories of key scientific discoveries by researchers such as Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Rafael Lorente de Nó, Thomas Graham Brown, Ethel Browne, Rita Levi-Montalcini, and Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, Yuste—using a clear and engaging style—reveals what the nervous system is, how it emerged through evolution, and how the brain uses the senses to anticipate the future and make intelligent decisions that guide our actions.

Packed with personal anecdotes, El cerebro, el teatro del mundo offers an extraordinary tour through the recent history of neuroscience, explaining how philosophers like Kant and writers such as Calderón de la Barca and Proust were ahead of their time—conceiving theories that are now being scientifically confirmed. For Yuste, understanding the mysteries of the brain places us at the dawn of a new renaissance—a new humanism that will help future generations shape a better world.

Today's complex research challenges demand effective teams, yet researchers rarely receive training in teamwork skills crucial for collaborative success.

This book fills that gap, outlining theory and providing practical actions that equip researchers with tools to build and sustain effective teams. Drawing on organizational psychology, team science and the authors’ own experience, it offers concrete practices for fostering collaborative innovation, managing diverse perspectives and achieving high-impact outcomes.

An essential reading for researchers, administrators and facilitators seeking to build high-performing teams, this indispensable resource enables researchers to effectively work across different disciplines and sectors to meet the evolving demands of funded research.

This updated edition is designed as a self-teaching, calculus-based introduction to the concepts of physics. Numerous examples, applications, and figures provide readers with simple explanations. Standard topics include vectors, conservation of energy, Newton’s Laws, momentum, motion, gravity, relativity, waves, fluid mechanics, circuits, nuclear physics, astrophysics, and more.

Features:

• Designed as a calculus-based, introduction to the key concepts of physics
• Practical techniques, including the collection, presentation, analysis and evaluation of data, are discussed in the context of key experiments linked to the theoretical spine of the work

Recent advancements in Transmission Electron Microscopy is built upon the remarkable achievements of the transmission electron microscope, especially, with the aberration corrected object lens, which itself is the incoherent integration of the particle electron optics and modern wave imaging technology.This involves the particle-wave duality of electrons.This book answers questions by applying the de Broglie Hypothesis and Einstein’s Theory of Relativity on the relationship between particles and electromagnetic waves to shed some light onto the electron microscopy. The first chapter explains what an electron is, which includes: (a) using the transmission electron microscope to observe the wave-particle duality of electrons, (b) the internal structure of the electron, (c) the electron as a confined electromagnetic vortices field in a corpuscle space. The following chapters, then, decipher the enigmatic relationship between the de Broglie wave of the electron and the internal electromagnetic flux circulatory motion, and analyze the spatiotemporal modification of the traveling electron corpuscle as it passes through the electron gun and magnetic lens. Based on the de Broglie wave of the traveling electron corpuscle at a certain velocity, the author defines the electron microscopy as the technology steering the velocity of the electron corpuscle assemble which encodes the information of periodic spatial grating constructed by the atoms and electromagnetic potential field, which surround the flying electrons. Then the author uses the space-time Talbot effects of the electrons to interpret the high resolution images, which was first developed by Ijima-Cowley, and expounds the contrast of the high resolution electron microscopy images as the intensity distribution of the assemble of corpuscle electron torus pulses train or beam at near field and at its far-field, which is a diffraction pattern. The final chapter of the book elaborates on how to understand the quantum electron microscopy. This book offers a comprehensive understanding what the quantum electron microscopy is, that may bring the microscopy field beyond the atom’s spatial periodicity in materials.

Numerical methods are the mathematical procedures that approximate the solution of complex mathematical problems into much simpler form and which find a wide variety of use while solving complex Physical Chemistry problems. This book aims to aide in understanding of such numerical methods including solving complex differential equations and numerical differentiation & integration. Moreover it also explains various statistical tests used in Analytical Chemistry for data analysis. The author has tried to include as many example from Chemistry problems for a better understanding of the methods.

In a post-COVID-19 pandemic era of cost-of-living crises and global displacements of people due to conflicts and climate challenges, food poverty is a growing and ever-pressing issue across both the Global North and the Global South. Presenting a collection of cases drawn from higher education research, teaching and learning, as well as campus and community-based initiatives, Higher Education and SDG2 addresses food security, nutrition, sustainable and resilient agriculture, and ending hunger for all.

Featuring chapters and cases from Australia, Canada, China, Indonesia, Italy, Malawi, Northern Ireland, Peru, Turkey, the UK, the USA, Vietnam and Zimbabwe, this edited collection demonstrates the fundamental role Higher Education has in helping deliver Zero Hunger. The chapters cover education, research and community engagement initiatives that aim to address how this issue impacts the nations that face the most widespread and severe effects of hunger, food insecurity, malnutrition, and unsustainable food systems. Focusing on opportunities for Higher Education to positively influence academic, innovation, and policy agendas, this synthesis of global approaches is an inspirational call to action for increasing meaningful engagement by universities and colleges to address SDG2 Zero Hunger.

Higher Education and the Sustainable Development Goals is a series of 17 books that address each of the SDGs through the lens of higher education. Adopting a solutions-based approach, each book focuses on how higher education is advancing delivery of Agenda 2030. The series is edited by Wendy Purcell, Professor with Rutgers University and Academic Research Scholar with Harvard University; Emeritus Professor and University President Emerita.

This book explains in clear and vivid language why light plays a central role in life and physical sciences. Fascinating relations arise between physics, chemistry and life sciences from the interaction of light with animate and inanimate matter. Twelve Nobel Prizes have been awarded in the last 30 years for discoveries on these topics including laser techniques, molecular machines, circadian rhythms fluorescent proteins and super-resolution microscopy. Photovoltaics, photocatalysis, photosynthesis, solar hydrogen production, atmospheric ozone production and destruction, DNA sequencing, human vision, and communication in the dark all depend on light absorption and emission. The book concludes with a survey of cultural aspects of light in religion, philosophy and art.

This introductory textbook on supramolecular chemistry is a thoroughly revised and expanded version of the 1st edition, originally published in 2020. All chapters have been brought up to date and now include "Further Reading" sections that highlight relevant developments. In addition, a new chapter on supramolecular polymers has been added. With these changes, this book provides an even more comprehensive introduction to the exciting field of supramolecular chemistry than before. Readers will learn what forces hold supramolecular architectures together, how supramolecular systems are created and characterized, how molecular switches, motors, transporters, catalysts, chemosensors, and other functional systems work, and where supramolecular chemistry can play or already plays a role in our lives.

In 2022 the first edition of this book won the Literature Prize of the German Chemical Industry Association VCI. For the full press release (in German): https://www.vci.de/fonds/presse-und-infos/pressemitteilungen/preisgeld-fuer-supramolekuele.jsp

Industrial Inorganic Chemistry adds to the previously published graduate level textbooks on Industrial Chemistry by Mark A. Benvenuto. It focuses specifically on inorganic processes, from the largest industrial process for the production of major inorganic chemicals and metals, down to and including smaller niche processes that have become extremely important in maintaining the current quality of life. The book provides a survey on the production of essential elements and compounds, such as sulfuric acid, calcium carbonate, fertilizers as well as numerous metals and alloys. In addition to the fundamental scientific principles each chapter includes discussions on the environmental impacts: mining of raw materials, creation of by-products, pollution, and waste generation, all of which have become key factors for the potential implementation of greener methods. The author also highlights ways in which industry has begun to make industrial inorganic processes more environmentally benign.

• Examines major inorganic chemistry processes, their effect on every-day life and current efforts to improve processes or adapt „green" chemical production.
• Provides didactic links between theoretical lecture contents and current, largescale chemical processes.
• Valuable for students of Inorganic Chemistry, Industrial Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Materials Science.

Biogenic toxins are fascinating natural products characterized by an enormous diversity of chemical structures and pharmacological activities. They not only pose hazards to humans and animals, but they are important components in the interplay of substances and living beings in nature and, moreover, important sources for new drugs.

Numerous images of plants and chemical structural formulas complete the book, as well as extensive references for further reading.

The multivolume reference is an essential resource for physicians, veterinarians, pharmacists, chemists, biochemists, food chemists and biologists, for students in the relevant fields, and maybe for interested laymen.

All aspects of natural toxins based on the latest scientific knowledge are included:

• All aspects of the toxicology of all living organisms and natural foods, chemistry, action mechanisms, symptoms of intoxications.
• The only book arranged on a strictly scientific base according to the biogenetic origin and chemical structure.

Natural Poisons and Venoms in 5 Volumes:

Volume 1: Plant Toxins: Terpenes and Steroids 2023, ISBN 978-3-11-072472-1

Volume 2: Plant Toxins: Polyketides, Phenylpropanoids and Further Compounds 2024, ISBN 978-3-11-072851-4

Volume 3: Plant Toxins: Alkaloids and Lectins 2025, ISBN 978-3-11-112740-8

Volume 5: Fungal and Microbial Toxins 2025, ISBN 978-3-11-072856-9

This volume aims to explore some of the practices, conflicts, negotiations and struggles at the interplay of bioethics and racism. This requires shedding light on the hegemonic power relationships that condemn some population groups to a condition of subjugation, suffering, and oppression. By unpacking notions that have been taken for granted and dismantling rhetorics that are veiled in discourses and rationales pertaining to race and racism, we highlight possible ways in which bioethics can operate across disciplinary boundaries and strengthen its connection with equity and social justice, which also entails striving for a "bioethics in action".

Industrial Organic Chemistry examines all major industrial manufacturing technologies and reaction types with a focus on organic chemistry in general and petroleum refining in particular. The author takes a systematic approach to introducing the most important classes of organic compounds, from the C1 fraction through to polyaromatics and polymers.

The author introduces biological sources for key compounds such as fuel and plastics and compares these bio-based organic materials to the corresponding petroleum-based chemicals.

In addition to the chemistry behind processes in the petroleum, pharma, food and agrochemical industries, this book also discusses related topics such as process selectivity, waste management, and product purification.

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This textbook provides ample opportunities for practice and real experimental demonstrations. Conceptual understanding and mastering key techniques are enhanced by rigorous derivations, numerous worked examples, more than 300 exercises, about 150 problems and 16 computer codes. The preface summarizes all of the key concepts and formulas, along with a detailed schedule for teaching.

The first three chapters introduce the quantum idea, wave-particle duality, operators and measurement. The Noether theorem is invoked to introduce the Schrödinger equation, followed by applications to infinite and finite quantum wells, quantum tunneling, harmonic oscillators, Heisenberg equation of motion, uncertainty principle, blackbody radiation and photoelectric effect. Chapters 4 and 5 are on angular momentum, the hydrogen atom and time-independent approximate methods. Chapters 6 and 7 are on spin and time-dependent perturbation theory. Chapters 8, 9 and 10 are on molecular orbitals, energy bands, quantum transport, scanning tunneling microscopy, lattice vibrations, Berry phase and quantum computing.

The book is intended for a one-semester or one-year course and is also appropriate for researchers in related fields.

Climate change is a major challenge facing the modern world. The chemistry of air and it's influence on the climate system forms the main focus of this monograph. The book presents a problem-based approach to presenting global atmospheric processes, evaluating the effects of changing air composition as well as possibilities for interference within these processes and indicates ways for solving the problem of climate change through chemistry.

We are still looking for a satisfactory definition of what makes an individual being a human individual. The understanding of human beings in terms of organism does not seem to be satisfactory, because of its reductionistic flavor. It satisfies our need for autonomy and benefits our lives thanks to its medical applications, but it disappoints our needs for conscious and free, self-determination. For similar reasons, i.e. because of its anti-libertarian tone, an organicistic understanding of the relationship between individual and society has also been rejected, although no truly satisfactory alternative for harmonizing individual and social wellness has been put forth. Thus, a reassessment of the very concepts of individual and organism is needed.

In this book, the authors present a specific line of thought which started with Leibniz' concept of monad in 17^th century, continued through Kant and Hegel, and as a result reached the first Eastern country to attempt to assimilate, as well as confront, with Western philosophy and sciences, i.e. Japan. The line of thought we are tracing has gone on to become one the main voices in current debates in the philosophy of biology, as well as philosophical anthropology, and social philosophy.

As a whole, the volume offers a both historical, and systematic account of one specific understanding of individuals and their environment, which tries to put together its natural embedding, as well as its dialectical nature. Such a historical, systematic map will also allow to better evaluate how life sciences impact our view of our individual lives, of human activities, of institutions, politics, and, finally, of humankind in general.

This work covers quantum mechanics by answering questions such as where did the Planck constant and Heisenberg algebra come from, what motivated Feynman to introduce his path integral and why does one distinguish two types of particles, the bosons and fermions. The author addresses all these topics with utter mathematical rigor. The high number of instructive Appendices and numerous Remark sections supply the necessary background knowledge.

Volume 12 of Reviews in Mineralogy introduces to fluid inclusions. It covers the folowing questions: when and where inclusions form. how they change, how to prepare material and make microthermometric measurementsl, how to interpret these data, and what has been found in applications of fluid-inclusion studies to each of a series of different geologic environments. This book also attempts to discuss the many applications of fluid inclusions to the study of and understanding of geologic processes and the geologic environments in which they acted.

This book provides a detailed analysis of human movement, building from simple physical models to more complex analyses and biomechanical models, including forces internal to the body. The book integrates principles of Physics with the functioning of the nervous and musculoskeletal systems to understand how movement in general, and dance movements specifically, can be executed to enhance performance and reduce injury risk.

Perspectives from worldwide experts on how major cities across the globe are responding to the major environmental threats of our time, including global climate change

Over half of the world’s population now lives in cities, and this share is expected to increase in the coming decades. With growing urbanization, cities and their residents face substantial environmental challenges such as higher temperatures, droughts, wildfires, and increased flooding. In response to these pressing challenges, some cities have begun to develop local environmental regulations that supplement national and environmental laws. In so doing, cities have stepped into a role that has been historically dominated by higher levels of government.

Global Sustainable Cities takes stock of the policies that have been implemented by cities around the world in recent years in several key areas: water, air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, and climate adaptation. It examines the advantages—and potential drawbacks—of allowing cities to assume a significant role in environmental regulation, given the legal and political constraints in which cities operate.

The contributors present a series of case studies of the actions that seven leading cities—Abu Dhabi, Beijing, Berlin, Delhi, London, New York, and Shanghai—are taking to improve their environments and adapt to climate change. The first volume of its kind, Global Sustainable Cities is a critical comparative assessment of the actions that major cities in the global North and South are taking to advance sustainability.

A Stanford University Press classic.

Now that ‘3-D models’ are so often digital displays on flat screens, it is timely to look back at the solid models that were once the third dimension of science. This book is about wooden ships and plastic molecules, wax bodies and a perspex economy, monuments in cork and mathematics in plaster, casts of diseases, habitat dioramas, and extinct monsters rebuilt in bricks and mortar. These remarkable artefacts were fixtures of laboratories and lecture halls, studios and workshops, dockyards and museums. Considering such objects together for the first time, this interdisciplinary volume demonstrates how, in research as well as in teaching, 3-D models played major roles in making knowledge. Accessible and original chapters by leading scholars highlight the special properties of models, explore the interplay between representation in two dimensions and three, and investigate the shift to modelling with computers. The book is fascinating reading for anyone interested in the sciences, medicine, and technology, and in collections and museums.

In this powerful work of conceptual and analytical originality, the author argues for the primacy of the material arrangements of the laboratory in the dynamics of modern molecular biology. In a post-Kuhnian move away from the hegemony of theory, he develops a new epistemology of experimentation in which research is treated as a process for producing epistemic things.

A central concern of the book is the basic question of how novelty is generated in the empirical sciences. In addressing this question, the author brings French poststructuralist thinking—notably Jacques Derrida’s concepts of “différance” and “historiality”—to bear on the construction of epistemic things. Historiographical perspective shifts from the actors’ minds to their objects of manipulation.

These epistemological and historical issues are illuminated in a detailed case study of a particular laboratory, that of the oncologist and biochemist Paul C. Zamecnik and his colleagues, located in a specific setting—the Collis P. Huntington Memorial Hospital of Harvard University at the Massachusetts General Hospital of Boston. The author traces how, between 1945 and 1965, this group developed an experimental system for synthesizing proteins in the test tube that put Zamecnik’s research team at the forefront of those who led biochemistry into the era of molecular biology.

The study of facial expression and its musculature undertaken by Guillaume-Benjamin Duchenne de Boulogne in 1862, an attempt to secure biological meaning in the natural language of the emotions, resulted in the pioneering Méchanisme du physiognomie humaine. Duchenne, who used photography to document his experiments, inspired Charles Darwin's Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872) and had a significant influence on artists (his teachings were incorporated into the curriculum of the École Normale Supérieur des Beaux Arts). Through Duchenne, François Delaporte provides a remarkable philosophical and historical examination of expressive physiology during the mid-nineteenth century and considers the science of emotion as a means of revealing inner life upon the surface of the face. The central concern of Anatomy of the Passions is how techniques of studying facial musculature became a point of contact between existing and novel understandings of the body's expressive anatomy. Delaporte shows that Duchenne entirely reordered the knowledge and limits of expressive physiology in science and art. The face became a site where the signs of inner life are silently revealed, not yet betrayed by speech, but brought forth by reflexive physiology or by technical manipulation.

This is a definitive, masterly history and synthesis of all that has been said (by theologians and scientists) and is known (to science) about the question, How old is the Earth? It explains in a simple and straightforward way the evidence and logic that have led scientists to conclude that the Earth and the other parts of the Solar System are not several thousand years old, as some today would have it, but four and one-half billion years old.

It is a fascinating story, but not so simple as single measurement. Our universe is a large, old, and complicated place. Earth and other bodies have endured a long and sometimes violent history, the events of which have frequently obscured the record that we seek to decipher. Although in detail the journey into Earth's past requires considerable scientific skill, knowledge, and imagination, the story is not so complicated that it cannot be explained to someone who wants to know and understand the basic evidence. This book, then, has been written for people with some modest background in science, but at a level that will allow the material to be useful and accessible to those without a deep knowledge of geology or physics or mathematics.

This is a detailed history of one of the most important and dramatic episodes in modern science, recounted from the novel vantage point of the dawn of the information age and its impact on representations of nature, heredity, and society. Drawing on archives, published sources, and interviews, the author situates work on the genetic code (1953-70) within the history of life science, the rise of communication technosciences (cybernetics, information theory, and computers), the intersection of molecular biology with cryptanalysis and linguistics, and the social history of postwar Europe and the United States.

Kay draws out the historical specificity in the process by which the central biological problem of DNA-based protein synthesis came to be metaphorically represented as an information code and a writing technology—and consequently as a “book of life.” This molecular writing and reading is part of the cultural production of the Nuclear Age, its power amplified by the centuries-old theistic resonance of the “book of life” metaphor. Yet, as the author points out, these are just metaphors: analogies, not ontologies. Necessary and productive as they have been, they have their epistemological limitations. Deploying analyses of language, cryptology, and information theory, the author persuasively argues that, technically speaking, the genetic code is not a code, DNA is not a language, and the genome is not an information system (objections voiced by experts as early as the 1950s).

Thus her historical reconstruction and analyses also serve as a critique of the new genomic biopower. Genomic textuality has become a fact of life, a metaphor literalized, she claims, as human genome projects promise new levels of control over life through the meta-level of information: control of the word (the DNA sequences) and its editing and rewriting. But the author shows how the humbling limits of these scriptural metaphors also pose a challenge to the textual and material mastery of the genomic “book of life.”

From reviews of the first edition (1994): "Extraordinarily well written . . . "
--Contemporary Sociology
"A readable chronicle aimed at a general audience . . . Graceful and accessible . . . "
--Dollars and Sense
"Has the potential to be a political bombshell in radical circles around the world."
--Environmental Action
The Vulnerable Planet has won respect as the best single-volume introduction to the global economic crisis.
With impressive historical and economic detail, ranging from the Industrial Revolution to modern imperialism, The Vulnerable Planet explores the reasons why a global economic system geared toward private profit has spelled vulnerability for the earth's fragile natural environment.
Rejecting both individualistic solutions and policies that tinker at the margins, John Bellamy Foster calls for a fundamental reorganization of production on a social basis so as to make possible a sustainable and ecological economy.
This revised edition includes a new afterword by the author.